Mezotoads

hello all i amonsgt many other things "sculpt toy soldiers" as some of you know
the processes are varied ranging from being sent a picture to copy all the way round to "french dragoons 1809 pattern uniform but yea make them dogs instead of humans"
one of the ways i sculpt is to make stuff i think somebody will buy from me an post either images or the models (im im damm sure they will take them) but sometimes they bounce here are some bouncers

Mezotoads!! 

or mezo american toad/frogs for no oldhammer related reason at all -- yea no reason! 

the models are slightly designed to siut old GW slann but also if you wanted fit onto 25mm bases if you wanted to use them as saurus proxies.

they have been given a more serious look as many observations were that they were too "kermitty" and comical.

but please note these have forward faceing eyes not side faceing eyes as many of the old GW ones did they are designed to mix in but could be used instead of as well. 

Magnus the traitor list for warmahordes

Hello all anybody who knows me even a little bit knows i CANNOT own a bunch of minis withpout converting them mainly due to OCDlike manias

so ive dabbled with Warmachine over the years and ive come to terms with the "rule of 3"
which states that becuase of the wildly powerfull and hugely varied list of possible options and ways to play, from time to time (roughly every 3-4 games hence the name) you will put a force down and it will just get sh%$*ed on and there is no purposeful way that you could change the result, basicly the force mix just completely overpowers yours.
For some games that's just awfull (from what i hear latest eldar for example) and will suck the life out of your will to play, but in warmahordes because the small size of the relative forces and the fact that you will do a rule of 3 to some other player regularly it actually bizarrely becomes a good thing (because of the possible variety at least) and its perfect for a putty pusher like me because the deep involved backstory as well means i get to convert stuff   --- "manic grin and double thumbs up!"

ok Magnus the triator is a Cygnarite general who supported the previous unpopular king of the faction who fled and keeps up a guerrilla war against the new king (but also does merc work as well to keep his followers fed and repaired) so between the two he can be found fighting on lots of fronts
and with the release of 2nd edition they also introduced "Tier-lists" which are character army lists that give certain bonuses to perticular warcasters (leaders) if they use certain models in order, these tier lists encourage thematic armies and and also sometimes allow model pairings which fall outside of the normal factions
the magnus list allows him to have either cygnar long gunners or trenchers unit (remains of his followers) and allows him to have Idrian skirmishers (desert dwellers only normally allowable for players of the menoth faction)

so the minis first off the magnus list only allows him to take mercenary warjacks (steam and magic robots from the game setting) but as a merc they would be constantly refitted and reworked and other jacks if defeated would be reconditioned and reworked, so i decided to mix and match the heads on the jacks, add extra armour plates and use a menoth heavy jack (traded to him by the Idrians) and old Cygnar light jack (remains of the force he fled with) and convert them to fit into proxies of 2 merc jacks.

when i paint them i cant remember exactly but background fluff says the "old" cygnar regime used either a lighter or deeper blue than standard cygnar royal blue.

"Mangler" type heavy jack first 

"Talon" type Light jack 

Remodded "Renegade" type jack 

Idrian Skirmishers now
i cant stand to have copy models (especially in skirmisher units)

TA! 

X-spress games canterbury

hello all some of you know that i used to own my own Games shop (Westgate games) which i bought whilst it was on the recessional Downturn and i hoped my enthusiasm (but total lack of real business XP) would allow me to bring it back to its heady glorious heights but due to a combination of
(1) poor stock choices for the area
(2) my total lack of business experience
(3) personal pig headedness about not listening to good advice,
(4) me wasting too much cash of my startup going in
(5) No advertising budget when i needed one
and the final straw Viz a Viz camels back was
(6) that December where 3 of big buying weekends out 4 where snowed out and me making 1/4 of what i should have done that month.
meant i had to declare bankrupt and shut shop

frankly it was a very painful experience because aside from the suppliers i had to let down (with me owing  some of them large sums of money) i felt i had let down my customers and i did various things afterwards to try to help them as much as i could.

so recently there has been a expansion into Canterbury by X-spress games its their 4th store and they have made a very strong effort to to modify their stock to the needs of the much more varied customer base here in Canters, the owner Chris and the manager Craig are very keen to support all forms of local gaming

Why am i even mentioning all this?

Well because i have been a little lost and without a "gaming home" and i and many others have been warmly welcomed in this store, so to this end i am fully endorsing it and saying officially that if you liked my store i recommend you shop here at X-spress games.
especially because of their downstairs gaming room (pictures below)

and below there are a series of pictures of the scenery items i am makeing for their really cool downstairs gaming room.